WHITBY musician and writer Tony Morris launches his new album of Amerynd flute music, Rail Bridge MWB 2/81, at the Station Hotel, Loftus, tonight at 8.30pm.

If the word ‘Amerynd’ does not ring a bell, let Tony explain: “I’ve just invented it. The ‘Y’ is pronounced as in ‘rhyme’ or as in the Scottish word ‘wynd’,” he says.

“If you Google ‘Amerynd’, you will get a full explanation from one of my websites but, put simply, ‘French Horn’ is the name of a musical instrument, so is ‘Native American Flute’. The name doesn’t imply that the instrument was made by an enrolled member of a tribe federally recognised by the United States Government, any more than French Horn implies it was made by a person with French citizenship.

“However, American lawyers, native or not, have got at this so that makers who aren’t so enrolled have to use the term ‘Native American Style Flute’. This is clumsy and legalistic, daft even, hence my decision to invent a cover-all word, Amerynd.”

Phew, that’s cleared that up.

Tony, a regular performer at the Black Swan Folk Club in York, recorded his album on location under the railway bridge at Glaisdale that now forms the CD’s name.

Immediately after Tony’s set tonight, musicians from Teesside will be playing in a free open mic session.